At 12/8/2014 1:31:50 PM, Benshapiro wrote:I've never understood how "nothing", literally meaning no thing, is meant to mean a thing when referring to nothing.

That's because it's not. Hopefully Krauss corrected him like Dawkins corrected Neil Degrasse Tyson at times. Krauss explains that nothing is actually a thing. You can find more about his videos. This would've proved his point if he used something from Lawrence Krauss, but instead he used Richard Dawkins, an evolutionary biologist who isn't specially trained in physics.

At 12/8/2014 1:31:50 PM, Benshapiro wrote:I've never understood how "nothing", literally meaning no thing, is meant to mean a thing when referring to nothing.

You can define "nothing" however the hell you like. You just need to be on the same page when discussing it, there is no "objectively correct" definition of nothing, much like there isn't one for morality :-p.

So when physicists and theologians debate each other, it's like watching two ships sail past each other, since they are talking about different concepts.

Law of Logic. Prerequisite to have interchanges known as "discussions". Because how can we talk of "no thing" if we do not assign a name. "Nothing" would be "Not"- anything.

Atheist tactic: Obfuscation or word games.Fallacy: Referential fallacy - assuming all words refer to existing things and that the meaning of words reside within the things they refer to, as opposed to words possibly referring to no real object or that the meaning of words often comes from how we use them.

At 12/8/2014 1:31:50 PM, Benshapiro wrote:I've never understood how "nothing", literally meaning no thing, is meant to mean a thing when referring to nothing.

You can define "nothing" however the hell you like. You just need to be on the same page when discussing it, there is no "objectively correct" definition of nothing, much like there isn't one for morality :-p.

So when physicists and theologians debate each other, it's like watching two ships sail past each other, since they are talking about different concepts.

But if you use the term "nothing" to refer to a thing, it's self-contradictory. Why not just refer to the thing to which you're actually referring (vacuums, virtual particles, etc) rather than "nothing"? If the universe arose from nothing, but nothing is actually referring to something, then the universe arose from some thing rather than no thing. It's an invariable contradiction of the meaning of the word. I don't see how different takes on the definition of 'morality' is analogous because morality isn't referring to any self-contradictory usage of the word. It would be more like using the term amorality to mean moral or immoral.

At 12/8/2014 1:31:50 PM, Benshapiro wrote:I've never understood how "nothing", literally meaning no thing, is meant to mean a thing when referring to nothing.

You can define "nothing" however the hell you like. You just need to be on the same page when discussing it, there is no "objectively correct" definition of nothing, much like there isn't one for morality :-p.

So when physicists and theologians debate each other, it's like watching two ships sail past each other, since they are talking about different concepts.

But if you use the term "nothing" to refer to a thing, it's self-contradictory. Why not just refer to the thing to which you're actually referring (vacuums, virtual particles, etc) rather than "nothing"? If the universe arose from nothing, but nothing is actually referring to something, then the universe arose from some thing rather than no thing. It's an invariable contradiction of the meaning of the word. I don't see how different takes on the definition of 'morality' is analogous because morality isn't referring to any self-contradictory usage of the word. It would be more like using the term amorality to mean moral or immoral.

That's because you are trying to apply your definition to the physicists definition, lol. Of course if will be self contradictory if you try to do that. The physicists definition isn't "no thing, not anything, etc.)